New staffing plan good news for music, art teachers

Superintendent of Schools George Tomyn unveiled his first staffing plan this week, one that restores full-time music and art teachers, as well as media specialists, back to most schools.

By Joe CallahanStaff writer

Superintendent of Schools George Tomyn unveiled his first staffing plan this week, one that restores full-time music and art teachers, as well as media specialists, back to most schools.The plan, which must be approved by the School Board and funded by the state, also eliminates 47 district-level positions, most of which are currently vacant, and adds 48 positions at 51 schools, primarily to help the district meet requirements of the class-size amendment.Rick Lankford, deputy superintendent over curriculum, said the staffing plan hinges upon state funding. If the district funding is cut for 2013-14, then the staffing plan would have to be reworked significantly.Theresa Boston-Ellis, the district's executive director of business services, said the document is the district's ideal staffing plan based on projected revenue. Only after the district receives its state funding in the spring will there be a guarantee all the staff listed in the plan will be funded.With projected improvement of the national and state economy, as well as Gov. Rick Scott's promise to pump more money into schools in 2013-14, officials are cautiously optimistic.In all, 17 educators — six in music, four in art and seven media specialists — split their time at two schools.Lankford said the plan is to hire educators to fill the open slots so that most of the affected schools will no longer have to share one educator."Yeahhhhhhhh," said Tereasa Evans, who teaches music at both Belleview and Reddick-Collier elementary schools, which are 30 miles apart. "I wish you could see me. I am doing a dance."Three schools will continue operating these non-core classes as they are now, a plan in place long before downsizing through attrition began two years ago in music, art and media.Eighth Street Elementary has one teacher who splits time teaching art and music, while Sparr and Anthony elementary schools share music and art teachers. Those three K-5 schools have the smallest enrollments in the district.The school-level staffing plan — which includes school administrators, teachers and staff — increased by 48 positions to 2,811, according to documents.On Thursday, the School Board spent a couple of hours poring over the plan, asking questions about the administration's vision. District officials announced that the 2013-14 staffing plan will cost the district about $1.3 million more than the current 2012-13 staffing.Board member Ron Crawford said no one in the staffing plan is safe at this point. He estimates that the district will need $4.2 million more from the state just to break even because of less funding from the state this year, rising cost of insurance, and the additional cost in staffing.Boston-Ellis said Scott's budget calls for about $400 per student more to districts. If that should happen, the district would receive about $16 million more in 2013-14. Crawford said the district cannot count on that amount.The proposed plan adds on average one staff member at every elementary school, which will help the district meet class-size amendment requirements.Up until November, Marion County had been the model district in meeting the class-size caps: up to 18 students in grades K-3; 22 in grades 4-8; and 25 in core high school classes.But last fall, retired Superintendent of Schools Jim Yancey announced it would be cheaper to pay the state penalty than to stay at, or under, every class cap.A state report late last year showed that 17.06 percent of Marion County classrooms were over the limit, therefore not meeting the class-size mandate. The district filed a plan showing how it would get back into compliance.Each year after the official 10-day head count, schools must painstakingly reshuffle classrooms, a process that causes headaches for district officials, principals, teachers and parents. The reshuffling is designed to ensure that every classroom at every school meets the requirements."Our goal is to meet class-size in 2013-14," Lankford said.Also, Legacy Elementary opens in Silver Springs Shores in August. Most Legacy teaching positions will come from schools losing students — Maplewood, Belleview-Santos and Greenway elementary schools. The district will have to add a few staff members — like a principal, dean and counselor — to the staffing plan to support Legacy.At the district level, the staffing plan shows a reduction of 47 positions, down to 1,029 total.The district-level administrative and superintendent staffing plan calls for one fewer employee, though there were many tweaks — positions added and others removed.On the curriculum side of the district's administration, there was a massive restructuring. But after the dust had cleared, only 7.5 vacated positions had been eliminated.The restructuring included the merger of five departments — elementary education, secondary education, staff development, federal programs, library/media services, and assessment and evaluation — into one.The new department will be called K-12 Services, which will be under the supervision of Pam Roberts, the newly named executive director.All those departments combined had 77 positions when Tomyn took office. Once all of the departments were merged, the staff was reduced to 65. Tomyn believes the department can run with 61 people in 2013-14. Again, many of the positions had already been vacated.During the upper-level administration reshuffling, Tomyn reduced the number of executive directors from 10 to five.Some of those executive directors have already been moved out of the district office to principal positions. The titles of three executive directors were downgraded to directors. Tomyn said he has not officially named those directors for 2013-14. Currently in those positions are Staff Development's Marilyn Underwood, Technology & Information System's Scott Hansen and Support Services' Tommy Crosby.Lankford said salaries for those positions will be adjusted accordingly beginning July 1.An executive director's pay range is from $87,599 to $99,192, while a director's range is from $83,975 to $95,100.Most of the district-level cuts were made in operations, which is under Deputy Superintendent Chester Gregory.Tomyn proposed reducing operations manpower by 38.5 positions to 739.5 employees.Sixteen of those cuts were made in dozens of departments that make up support services, which include everything from carpenters to electricians. In transportation, the district cut 18 of 530 positions, including eliminating 15 vacant bus driver positions.Chris Altobello, president of the teachers' union known as Marion Education Association, said his main complaint with the new staffing plan is the reduction of counselors, from 88 districtwide to 85.Though only three were cut, these professionals are key to helping students with problems and detecting potential of school violence."We are concerned about removing any counselors, especially in terms of school safety," Altobello said.Contact Joe Callahan at 867-4113 or joe.callahan@starbanner.com.